My first piece of furniture

This is the first furniture project that I have worked on and I think it turned out pretty well. It was a lot more work than my typical cutting board or rough carpentry project that I’m used too, but I am quite proud of the results. What do you think LumberJocks?

I was going for a mission style look because I wanted to keep it very light and open, which I like in my small house. The lumber is quartersawn red oak with a danish oil finish for the legs and slats that has a great curly figure that I can’t seem to capture on camera. The shelves are solid red oak w/ a danish oil finish as well.

Most of the joints are mortise and tenon for the sides and back, including all the slats. It was my first time trying mortise and tenon joints but they were actually pretty fun to work on. A properly mating mortise and tenon is extremely satisfying. The only non M&T joints in the project are the shelves and top which are pocket screws and dowel joints respectively.

I built this without any plans other than rough dimensions which slowed me down quite a bit. I don’t think I will do that again for any but the smallest projects or details. I am quite handy in sketchup so I really don’t know what I was thinking. That is only one of the MANY lessons learned throughout this project.

I made a couple mistakes during construction, the worst of which was probably my inattention to humidity. My shelves looked great after glue-up but they started to cup significantly despite my alternating grain arrangement. It took a lot of effort to bring them back to flat after I had allowed them to soak up so much moisture from my damp basement. Thankfully a dehumidifier brought down the worst of it and a block plane and a lot of patience took care of the rest.

I also had a bit of a glue-up blunder when I swapped my front legs which resulted in my mortises being on the outside. I am still not sure how I missed that during assembly but c’est la vie. I cut a false through tenon to fit the hole and it doesn’t look too bad.

Anyway, thanks for taking a look! Any thoughts, criticisms, or suggestions are always appreciated!

Dang fine start prof…I looked at the pics and was super impressed with that “through tenon” and was thinking how sharp that was. Then I read your description and was even more impressed at how sharp you are…lol Looks great

-- Buster, Ocoee TN (Critics are men who watch a battle from a high place then come down and shoot the survivors - Hemingway)